ELECTION OF A NEW POPE.
The miscarriage of the French before Coni affected Louvois, the minister of Louis, so deeply, that he could not help shedding tears when he communicated the event to his master, who told him with great composure that he was spoiled by good fortune. But the retreat of the French from Piedmont had a still greater influence over the resolutions of the conclave at Rome, then sitting for the election of a new pope in the room of Alexander VIII., who died in the beginning of February. Notwithstanding the power and intrigues of the French faction headed by cardinal d’Etrées, the affairs of Piedmont had no sooner taken this turn than the Italians joined the Spanish and Imperial interest, and cardinal Pignatelli, a Neapolitan, was elected pontiff. He assumed the name of Innocent, in honour of the last pope known by that appellation, and adopted all his maxims against the French monarch. When the German auxiliaries arrived under the command of the elector of Bavaria, the confederates resolved to give battle to Catinat; but he repassed the Po, and sent couriers to Versailles to solicit a reinforcement. Then prince Eugene invested Carmagnola, and carried on the siege with such vigour that in eleven days the garrison capitulated. Meanwhile the marquis de Hoquincourt undertook the conquest of Montmelian, and reduced the town without much resistance. The castle, however, made such a vigorous defence that Catinat marched thither in person; and, notwithstanding all his efforts, the place held out till the second day of December, when it surrendered on honourable conditions.
THE EMPEROR’S SUCCESS AGAINST THE TURKS.
This summer produced nothing of importance on the Rhine. The French endeavoured to surprise Mentz, by maintaining a correspondence with one of the emperor’s commissioners; but this being discovered, their design was frustrated. The imperial army, under the elector of Saxony, passed the Rhine in the neighbourhood of Manheim; and the French, crossing the same river at Philipsburgh, reduced the town of Portzheim in the marquisate of Baden-Dourlach. The execution of the scheme projected by the emperor for this campaign, was prevented by the death of his general, the elector of Saxony, which happened on the second day of September. His affairs wore a more favourable aspect in Hungary, where the Turks were totally defeated by prince Louis of Baden on the banks of the Danube. The imperialists afterwards undertook the siege of Great Waradin in Translyvania; bitt this was turned into a blockade, and the place was not surrendered till the following spring. The Turks were so dispirited by the defeat, by which they had lost the grand vizier, that the emperor might have made peace upon very advantageous terms; but his pride and ambition overshot his success. He was weak, vain, and superstitious; he imagined that now the war of Ireland was almost extinguished, king William, with the rest of his allies, would be able to humble the French power, though he himself should not co-operate with heretics, whom he abhorred; and that, in the meantime, he should not only make an entire conquest of Transylvania, but also carry his victorious arms to the gates of Constantinople, according to some ridiculous prophecy by which his vanity had been flattered. The Spanish government was become so feeble, that the ministry, rather than be at the expense of defending the Netherlands, offered to deliver the whole country to king William, either as monarch of England, or stadtholder of the United Provinces. He declined this offer, because he knew the people would never be reconciled to a protestant government; but he proposed that the Spaniards should confer the administration of Flanders upon the elector of Bavaria, who was ambitious of signalizing his courage, and able to defend the country with his own troops and treasure. This proposal was relished by the court of Spain; the emperor imparted it to the elector, who accepted the office without hesitation; and he was immediately declared governor of the Low Countries by the council of state at Madrid. King William, after his return from the army, continued some time at the Hague settling the operations of the ensuing campaign. That affair being discussed, he embarked in the Maese, and landed in England on the nineteenth day of October.
WILLIAM AND MARY, 1688—1701.
AFFAIRS OF IRELAND.
Before we explain the proceedings in parliament, it will be necessary to give a detail of the late transactions in Ireland. In the beginning of the season, the French king had sent a large supply of provisions, clothes, and ammunition, for the use of the Irish at Limerick, under the conduct of Monsieur St. Ruth, accompanied by a great number of French officers furnished with commissions from king James, though St. Kuth issued all his orders in the name of Louis. Tyrconnel had arrived in January with three frigates and nine vessels, laden with succours of the same nature; otherwise the Irish could not have been so long kept together. Nor indeed could these supplies prevent them from forming separate and independent bands of rapparees, who plundered the country, and committed the most shocking barbarities. The lords justices, in conjunction with general Ginckel, had taken every step their prudence could suggest to quiet the disturbances of the country, and prevent such violence and rapine, of which the soldiers in king William’s army were not entirely innocent. The justices had issued proclamations denouncing severe penalties against those who should countenance or conceal such acts of cruelty and oppression: they promised to protect all papists who should live quietly within a certain frontier line; and Ginckel gave the catholic rebels to understand that he was authorized to treat with them, if they were inclined to return to their duty. Before the armies took the field, several skirmishes had been fought between parties; and these had always turned out so unfortunate to the enemy, that their spirits were quite depressed, while the confidence of the English rose in the same proportion.